Passing Nightmares
by nikkiRA
Summary: Oneshot, LunaHermione/ She notices little things that fascinate her. The space between her teeth, her eyes as they flick back and forth across the pages of her books. Sometimes her lips will mouth the words, and Luna likes to pretend she's talking to her.


Written for the Big Gay Meme going on over on LJ, for the prompt

Luna Lovegood x any girl of your choosing  
**Prompt:** _Sometimes you fall, spinning through space, grasping for the things that keep you on this earth. Sometimes you catch them...sometimes they catch you._ She may be crazy, but she knows what love is.

* * *

She hears the slip of her tongue and it doesn't really bother her. It happens a few times and she barely even notices, so used to it.

The thing she notices is that she corrects herself.

_Loony- er, Luna Lovegood._

_

* * *

_

Sometimes she finds herself staring at her. She notices little things that fascinate her. The space between her teeth, the frizz of her hair, her eyes as they flick back and forth across the pages of her books. Sometimes her lips will mouth the words, forming the letters, and Luna likes to pretend she's talking to her.

* * *

One time, Ginny asks her if she has a crush on her brother. Luna stares at her with wide eyes and Ginny says, _it's just... you're always staring at them. _

It might be easier just to tell Ginny the truth. Instead she starts talking about wrackspurts. It's just easier.

* * *

Later, she'll join Dumbledore's Army. The meetings provide her with a hope that maybe Hogwarts will return to what it once was. And she makes friends. For the most part, people see her as more than just Loony Lovegood. Sort of.

She duals with her, sometimes. She always wins. Luna doesn't mind.

* * *

A year goes by. She hangs out with her, and they talk. They talk about books and lessons and learning and she doesn't even scoff when Luna talks about all the different things she believes in, doesn't make fun of her. She can tell by her slightly stiff posture that she doesn't believe a word Luna is saying, but that's okay.

They become friends. Smiles are directed at her. Later, she'll comfort her as she cries in the bathroom.

Luna asks her why she isn't in Ravenclaw and she says simply that the Hat said she would excel more in Gryffindor. Luna reminds herself that even if she were in Ravenclaw, they wouldn't sleep in the same room.

* * *

Everything changes. Dumbledore dies and Snape takes over, and she leaves behind the world of Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, Nargles and Blibbering Humdingers in exchange for fighting, for beatings and punishment and the newly revived Dumbledore's Army. Ginny and Neville and Luna, fighting the Death Eaters, trying to win back the school. They all fight for somebody. Ginny fires a curse for her brother and the boy she loves. Neville will succeed and make his parents proud.

She fights. She fights for her mother and her father, for the people at the school who can't do a thing, for people who never fit in. And she fights for her, wherever she is.

* * *

(the darkness wants to consume her sometimes. the man beside her cries often and she clenches his hand, tries to support him, ignores the threatening stench of death that creeps up on them. she will sing sometimes, and tell stories to pass the time. he doesn't care that she tells him of moon frogs and umgubular slashkilter's. sometimes she thinks he doesn't even hear.

angels appear out of the darkness, but the happy moment is punctured by the shrieks coming from above. ron sobs and pounds the walls and she clenches her teeth and pretends it is someone else who is screaming. her heart stutters and tears burn her eyes and just when she thinks the screaming will burn a hole through her brain she is lifted away)

* * *

It is hard to find a time when Ron is not by her side but one of the rare time he leaves her bedside she slips into the room. Luna grabs her hand and she shifts on the bed.

"How are you?"

"I should be asking you the same question."

She pulls on Luna's hand, gently. She takes this as an invitation and crawls into the bed beside her, listening to the other girl breathe beside her.

"Thank you for coming to save me."

There are footsteps in the hallway, a Weasley coming to claim his prize.

"I'll always come to save you."

* * *

The rest? The rest is history. It will be written in a hundred books and will forever be remembered, the Battle of Hogwarts, where Harry Potter defeated the Dark Lord.

She was there. She lived it. It will haunt her memories, will keep her up at night, will plague her dreams. She will wake up screaming.

A hand will latch onto hers and pull her back from the edge. She will wake to a steady presence beside her, a hand on her waist, a nose in her hair. It will remind her of another day, after the battle, where those gentle hands found her curled up under a tree and coaxed her out of herself, cupped her chin and folded the two of them together.

"It's a nightmare."

A nightmare that will pass. In the morning the details will fade away, but those hands will still be there, supporting her.


End file.
